KPCC bolsters newsroom, Babes of NPR blogger joins pubradio, and more comings and goings in pubmedia

Southern California Public Radio/KPCC in Los Angeles has bulked up its news department in recent months, adding eight staffers to its team and promoting several employees.

Since mid-October the station has hired Stephen Gregory as science and environment editor; Doug Krizner, business and emerging communities editor; Dorian Marina, reporter and producer for Take Two, a locally produced weekday newsmagazine; Kristen Lepore, digital producer for social media; Jed Kim, environment reporter; Adrian Florido, community health care reporter; Jeremy Hoffing, software developer; and Joel Withrow, project manager for mobile news experience.

KPCC has also promoted Steve Profitt to program developer for broadcast, Molly Peterson to environment correspondent and Stephanie O’Neill to health care correspondent.

Meanwhile, the station has cut two general-assignment reporters and a reporter based at the state capitol in Sacramento. “These moves reflect a shift in resources . . . as we strive to better compete in the digital age,” wrote Russ Stanton, v.p. of content, in an email.

The expansion has been funded in part by a $1 million grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation to support development of an iPad app. Major gifts, increased donations from listeners and grants from the Ford Foundation, the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation and health-care foundations have also fueled the growth. KPCC has expanded its news staff by 50 percent over the past 18 months, according to Stanton.

A blogger who started a popular Tumblr about public radio personalities has managed to turn that side project into an entrée into the field.

Katie Herzog, the blogger behind Babes of NPR, joined WFAE in Charlotte, N.C. this month as a social media coordinator. “I do think I got the job in large part because of Babes of NPR, which is funny because that’s the thing I was doing at my old job to avoid actually working,” Herzog wrote in an email to Current.

Herzog launched Babes of NPR in 2011 while working at an academic publishing house. The blog, which features photos of staffers across the country along with Herzog’s commentary, began to attract attention from people in the field. A longtime public radio fan, Herzog started meeting the personalities she was blogging about, and she learned that her lack of experience in radio wasn’t necessarily a barrier to working in the system. Being a producer “was the perfect job for someone who is curious about the world; it’s the job, I realized, that I want,” she wrote on her personal blog.

Before joining WFAE, Herzog worked as an intern for the now-defunct The Story at WUNC in Chapel Hill, N.C.

Management

West Virginia Public Broadcasting has hired Kristi George as director of radio. She replaces James Muhammad, who left the organization last spring. George spent five years as a client services manager at Public Radio International. It’s her second stint at the station; from 1996 to 2002 she worked on the air as well as in operations and membership.

Tom Cohen has joined KCTS-TV in Seattle as v.p. of content. Most recently, Cohen worked as a media, technology and marketing consultant for companies in Seattle, including Microsoft. He retired in 2007 after 14 years in management of corporate media services and other positions with Microsoft TV and MSN.com.

Programming

Eric Eggleton has joined WFYI Public Media as executive producer for 90.1 FM’s Sound Medicine series, a weekly newsmag about medicine and health now in its twelfth season. Previously, Eggleton was content operations director at Montgomery Community Media, a public access service in Montgomery County, Md. From 1999 to 2009, he was Maryland Public Television’s senior vice president and chief content officer.

Anthony Mackie is the host for Season 6 of the documentary series AfroPop: The Ultimate Cultural Exchange. He has acted in the films 8 Mile, Million Dollar Baby and The Hurt Locker.

New York’s WNYC hired Sean Bowditch as executive editor, supervising daily news across all platforms. Bowditch was previously filling in as senior producer for Marketplace Morning Report.

KCRW in Santa Monica, Calif., has added Andrew Walsh and Jolie Myers to the team producing its upcoming show hosted by Madeleine Brand, former show host for NPR and KPCC in Pasadena. Walsh, who will serve as e.p., previously produced and hosted his own show on KIRO-FM in Seattle; he has also produced shows for New Hampshire Public Radio and WKSU in Kent, Ohio. Myers, who joins the new KCRW show as a producer, most recently worked as an associate producer for Marketplace’s Wealth and Poverty Desk.

Quinn Bowman has returned to PBS NewsHour as its Capitol Hill producer. Bowman originally joined the show in 2007 as a desk assistant, progressing to assistant editor for online and politics reporter/producer. He left in 2012 to join Feature Story News.

WNPR-FM in Hartford, Conn., has named Catie Talarski e.p. Talarski was founding senior producer of Where We Live, the station’s daily news/talk show. She has produced documentaries for Hearing Voices, Studio 360 and Public Radio Exchange.

Evan Dawson has joined WXXI in Rochester, N.Y., as host of Connections, a new weekly interview talk show. Dawson formerly worked as morning news anchor at 13WHAM-TV in Rochester for six years. An earlier incarnation of his WXXI show, 1370 Connection, was hosted by Bob Smith, who left due to health reasons after working for the station for 25 years.

Digital

NPR has hired Liz Danzico as creative director. In the newly created position, Danzico will work within the network’s digital media team to oversee the visual and user experience across NPR’s digital platforms and content. She previously founded the MFA in Interaction Design program at the School of Visual Arts in New York. Danzico has also worked as an independent consultant on digital programs for global companies and nonprofits including This American Life and the New York Times.

A veteran of the Knight-Mozilla OpenNews program has joined the data news team at New York’s WNYC. Noah Veltman, who spent the last year building interactive news and graphics applications for BBC News Online as an OpenNews fellow, has taken a position as a front-end developer.

Communications

PBS Hawaii has appointed Liberty Peralta as director of communications, a new position. She joined PBS Hawaii in 2011 as the public television station’s first multimedia writer. In her new role, Peralta will oversee communications, media relations, advertising, online and social media marketing. She will also oversee the station’s program guide and weekly e-newsletter.

Development/marketing

GPB Media in Atlanta appointed Bert Huffman as v.p. of development and marketing. Huffman most recently served as chief development officer for the Atlanta Opera.

Three new members were elected to the board of Greater Public, the development and fundraising organization for public media: Ken Ikeda, managing director at Public Radio Capital; Kliff Kuehl, president of Kansas City Public Television; and Quyen Shanahan, associate g.m. at WXPN in Philadelphia.